Boston Mayor Michelle Wu launches reelection campaign

Local News

Wu outlined the progress she has made during her term on issues from safety to education.

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu kicked off her reelection campaign Saturday in the South End at the Boston Center for the Arts Cyclorama with a passionate call for continuing what she described as “big progress on the big challenges” Boston is facing.

Wu described her efforts during her mayorship to reduce gun violence, increase affordable housing, combat climate change, and invest in Boston Public Schools. 

“Over the last four years, I’ve seen Boston’s promise and possibility every day, across every part of our city,” Wu said. 

She referenced her background as the oldest child in an immigrant family, a caregiver for her mother and sisters, and a mother herself. 

“I’ve had to be a fighter my whole life,” she said. “As a city councilor and now mayor, fighting for people over profits, a city our kids will be proud of, a Boston that is home for everyone.”

Wu took aim at the Trump administration’s recent actions, and said it’s not “just our country and our democracy that are under attack,” but also smaller communities, Boston included.

Wu testified in front of Congress last month in Washington, D.C., defending Boston’s sanctuary status and immigration policies alongside mayors from Chicago, New York, and Denver, which are also designated sanctuary cities. 

“Four years ago, none of us could have imagined what these past three months have looked like,” Wu said in her speech. “It feels like everything that makes Boston Boston is being threatened by an administration that is clearly threatened by who we are as a city.” 

Earlier in the day, she spoke at Boston’s “Hands Off!” rally, one of many demonstrations around the country Saturday in protest of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s actions, which saw thousands march from the Parkman Bandstand on Boston Common to City Hall Plaza.

Wu’s challengers for mayor include Josh Kraft, who heads Kraft Family Philanthropies as the son of New England Patriots’ owner Robert Kraft and is running as a Republican, and community activist Domingos DaRosa, who entered the race as an Independent last month. A win for Kraft or Domingo would make him the first candidate to unseat an incumbent Boston mayor since 1949. 

In her speech, she lambasted Kraft’s lack of political experience and possible conflicts of interest, saying, “now is not the time for a mayor who needs on-the-job training.”

“Now is certainly not the time to hand the keys over to billionaires or developers,” Wu said. “We have already seen what happens when billionaires and real estate developers try to run a country. We don’t need to see what happens if they run a city too.”

Wu will appear Sunday on WCVB’s “On the Record.”